Tales of a Traveller eBook

we sometimes pick up a very decent day’s work.
Now and then the muse is unkind, or the day uncommonly
quiet, and then we rather starve; and sometimes the
unconscionable editors will clip our paragraphs when
they are a little too rhetorical, and snip off twopence
or threepence at a go. I have many a time had
my pot of porter snipped off of my dinner in this
way; and have had to dine with dry lips. However,
I cannot complain. I rose gradually in the lower
ranks of the craft, and am now, I think, in the most
comfortable region of literature.

“And pray,” said I, “what may you
be at present!” “At present,” said
he, “I am a regular job writer, and turn my hand
to anything. I work up the writings of others
at so much a sheet; turn off translations; write second-rate
articles to fill up reviews and magazines; compile
travels and voyages, and furnish theatrical criticisms
for the newspapers. All this authorship, you
perceive, is anonymous; it gives no reputation, except
among the trade, where I am considered an author of
all work, and am always sure of employ. That’s
the only reputation I want. I sleep soundly,
without dread of duns or critics, and leave immortal
fame to those that choose to fret and fight about it.
Take my word for it, the only happy author in this
world is he who is below the care of reputation.”

The preceding anecdotes of Buckthorne’s early
schoolmate, and a variety of peculiarities which I
had remarked in himself, gave me a strong curiosity
to know something of his own history. There was
a dash of careless good humor about him that pleased
me exceedingly, and at times a whimsical tinge of
melancholy ran through his humor that gave it an additional
relish. He had evidently been a little chilled
and buffeted by fortune, without being soured thereby,
as some fruits become mellower and sweeter, from having
been bruised or frost-bitten. He smiled when
I expressed my desire. “I have no great
story,” said he, “to relate. A mere
tissue of errors and follies. But, such as it
is, you shall have one epoch of it, by which you may
judge of the rest.” And so, without any
farther prelude, he gave me the following anecdotes
of his early adventures.

BUCKTHORNE, OR THE YOUNG MAN OF GREAT EXPECTATIONS.

I was born to very little property, but to great expectations;
which is perhaps one of the most unlucky fortunes
that a man can be born to. My father was a country
gentleman, the last of a very ancient and honorable,
but decayed family, and resided in an old hunting lodge
in Warwickshire. He was a keen sportsman and
lived to the extent of his moderate income, so that
I had little to expect from that quarter; but then
I had a rich uncle by the mother’s side, a penurious,
accumulating curmudgeon, who it was confidently expected
would make me his heir; because he was an old bachelor;
because I was named after him, and because he hated
all the world except myself.